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Webster 1913 Edition

Noun.

Prelacy.

[Obs.]

Milton.

Noun.

Episcopacy; prelacy. [Not in use.]

prelaty ‎(uncountable)

(now historical) The system of ecclesiastic governance by prelates or bishops; episcopacy, prelacy.
- 1644, John Milton, Aeropagitica:
  That those evills of Prelaty which before from five or six and twenty Sees were distributivly charg'd upon the whole people, will now light wholly upon learning, is not obscure to us [...].